The early detection of disease epidemics reduces the chances of introduction in to new locales, minimizes the number of infections, and reduces the financial impact. The effectiveness of disease control measures often depends on early detection of disease incidence or outbreak and significantly reduces the cost associated with disease eradication and devastation of livestock. Passive surveillance methods are the voluntary reporting of cases by primary care providers and farmers to veterinary health system where as Active surveillance of livestock diseases are periodic sampling by veterinary health officials. Active surveillance methods are often performing better for targeted objectives than passive methods and useful in making active surveillance methods more cost effective, an important consideration for surveillance system with limited resources. Developing an optimal sampling strategy for surveillance of livestock diseases is an important for an early detection of disease incidence and it offers the effectiveness of utilisation of limited resources in the surveillance in addition to offering random, representative and independence of sampling units in order to derive the scientifically valid results.
